Ex Eskom CEO Brian Molefe’s Luxury Bushveld Lodge Auctioned Off at a Loss

• Former Eskom CEO Brian Molefe’s luxury bushveld lodge has been auctioned off at a loss of over R5 million. 
• He originally paid R8.5 million and financed the purchase by taking out a home with Standard Bank who called in the loan in after Molefe defaulted on the monthly payments. 
• Molefe’s R30 million pension was also recently returned to Eskom.

The story of Molefe and his pension fund was broken by Daily Maverick’s Pauli van Wyk shortly after Molefe tearfully resigned as Eskom CEO in December 2016. This was after he was linked to the Gupta family in Thuli Madonsela’s State of Capture report — her final report as Public Protector. Read in Daily Maverick: SCORPIO: The pension like no other — the truth of Brian Molefe’s R30m Eskom ‘golden handshake’ exposed

The report showed that Molefe and Ajay Gupta, the eldest of the Gupta brothers, had made 58 telephone calls to each other between August 2015 and March 2016, and that Molefe had visited their Saxonwold compound 19 times in a similar timeframe. Two brothers, currently facing extradition from Dubai, are largely considered the chief architects of state capture in South Africa, looting billions of rands from various state owned entities in the process.

According to a notice in the Government Gazette, Molefe’s  4 46m² property in the Legend Golf & Safari Resort in Limpopo was set to go on sale in April.

When Molefe left Eskom, he illegally signed off on a R30 million pension package for himself.

Recently, Eskom confirmed that it has successfully recovered the R30 million it unlawfully paid to the Eskom Pension & Provident Fund (EPPF) for the benefit former Chief Executive Officer Brian Molefe during 2016. In July 2022 the North Gauteng High Court re-affirmed a 2018 high court judgement that had reviewed and set aside a 2016 early retirement agreement between Mr Molefe and Eskom. In terms of the agreement, Eskom paid to the EPPF approximately R30 million to boost Mr Molefe’s early retirement pension pay-out.

Author: Bryan Groenendaal